On #mooreandme

The #mooreandme campaign? The one that finally, after a week, got Michael Moore to come down out of the tower and state to Rachel Maddow on her TV show, that when women make allegations of rape, that those allegations need to be taken seriously, without question? As Sady put it so well, we made the mountain move three inches to the left?

I believe that I am doing God's work by participating in this campaign.

This campaign is part of what it means to me to be a Christian leftist. Joining with people of good will, regardless of faith or lack thereof, in bringing the powerful down a notch, giving the oppressed a voice, saying "no" to the rape culture, saying that it is without exception unacceptable to belittle and demean those who have been victimized by rape, unacceptable to make so-called "jokes", unacceptable to threaten women with rape for daring to speak out against rape culture, who dare to critique and demand accountability from powerful media figures like Michael Moore, Keith Olbermann, and Naomi Wolf. Adding my voice to the thousands tweeting to #mooreandme, blogging, demanding accountability from media figures that promote rape culture.

I really didn't participate very much. I posted a couple of dozen tweets, retweeted some other tweets, left a few comments here and there on a few blogs, donated a couple small sums of money. It's nothing compared to the work that Sady Doyle did, spending almost every waking hour for a week and dealing with trolls threatening her with rape and violence.

I don't have many spoons. My disabilities, too numerous to list here (have a look at my profile) consume most of my energy. Hearing and reading Michael Moore and Keith Olbermann belittle the Swedish women who have alleged that Assange raped them; reading KO defend his decision to uncritically spread the lie, perpetrated by a virulent anti-Semite, that one of the woman was a "CIA agent"; reading the supposed "feminist icon" Naomi Wolf claim that raping unconscious women is not rape, that raping women who are in a relationship with their rapist (as I was) isn't rape; seeing trolls threaten rape against women on #mooreandme – all this was very triggering to me, sent me into a tailspin on Monday and I'm still spiraling down, and all I want to do now is sleep all day, not eat, cry.

But somehow I need to find a little bit of strength so I don't just disappear from the 'nets as I have in the past. I believe it is God's will that I not fall silent. I hope and pray that I can find the energy and will to go beyond blogging and tweeting (though I'm not discounting the importance of online activism, I mean, look what happened this week!) to going out into the streets in protest, and financially supporting and lending my labor to organizations that need it.

For the moment, I need some sleep and some time in fantasy worlds.

Google Street View is a hazard to victims of crime.

Ever since it became available, I have been uncomfortable with Google Street View. I've never been able to clearly express my discomfort. After all, Street View sees only what is visible to the public anyway!

In the wake of the rape allegations against Julian Assange, it is clear to me that Street View is a threat to victims of crime [bold mine]:

Invective is one thing, but the material being bandied around about Accuser 1 and Accuser 2 is surely un­precedented in ongoing investigations into alleged sex offences, where anonymity for alleged victims is the norm. Their names and faces are freely available (search one of them on Google, and you get 84,900 results), and yesterday it took the Sunday Tribune just a few moments to find the women's home addresses and mobile telephone numbers being circulated on the net. A Street View user could pick out the buildings within seconds.

Google needs to address the implications of this. Eric Schmidt, I'd like to ask you a question: Do you know how many victims of crime you have endangered with Street View? Do you care that Street View makes it easier to silence and bring harm to victims of rape?

[Edited to fix a busted blockquote]